Barely Carefully Happily
by LaClaireFolie
Summary: Clara has saved the Doctor a billion times over. She knows it and so does he, but what he doesn't know is how much it broke Clara. Taking her back into the TARDIS after what happened on Trenzalore, he very slowly starts to realize that she has been almost broken and he is the only person able to mend her. [Sequel to "Softly, Quietly, Desperately", but set after the series 7 finale]
1. Barely

Titel: Barely, Carefully, Happily

Disclaimer: Nope, I am (very unfortunately) not British. I am also most definitely not the British Broadcasting Company. Thus I don't own Doctor Who.

Synopsis: Clara has saved the Doctor a billion times over. She knows it and so does he, but what he doesn't know is how much it broke Clara. Taking her back into the TARDIS after what happened on Trenzalore, he very slowly starts to realize how big a sacrifice Clara made when she threw herself into his timeline. She's cracking and he is the only person able to mend her. [Sequel to "Softly, Quietly, Desperately", but set after "The Name of the Doctor".]

Author's Note: So a few people expressed their hope for more "Softly Quietly Desperately" after I posted the last chapter and, after watching "The Name of the Doctor", this idea lodged itself in my brain and has been demanding to be written. But this might be confusing if you haven't read SQD and if I don't do some explaining, so here it goes:

Basically this is set after "The Name of the Doctor" as well as SQD. Clara and the Doctor did all the things they did in SQD – the Rings of Akhaten in a slightly AU – ish way, ice cream on Barcelona, visiting the Library, the broken glass bowl, future Cardiff, the jungle planet, the Doctor's nightmares and finally, the human war spaceship where the Doctor is tortured – and have been a couple for quite a bit. They also had a few of the adventures they had in the 7th series – namely "Cold War", "Hide", "Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS" and "Nightmare in Silver" – before Vastra, Jenny and Strax were kidnapped and they had to go to Trenzalore. This story starts right were the episode ends. But not all of the adventures have happened in that order, I've taken the liberty to set "Cold War", "Hide", "Journey to the Centre of the TARDIS and "Nightmare in Silver" before the events of the human war spaceship in SQD and "Hide" has happened directly after the day that never was. Basically Clara thinks they haven't had their Wednesday adventure yet so once the "Do you feel safe?" – conversation has taken place, the Doctor decides to go and see Emma Grailing at Caliburn house to try and find out something more about Clara. Afterwards he takes her home where she talks to Artie and Angie, then "Nightmare in Silver" happens and then the Doctor gets tortured, then they become a couple, have a few minor adventures and then Vastra and Jenny initiate the conference thingy, starting the events shown in "The Name of the Doctor".

Of course, a lot of conversation thingies would have happened entirely different, but I'll leave those to your imagination. So, enough of my rambling. I hope you enjoy this.

Love, ClaireFolie

Barely

When he has found her again, his only thought was that he needed to touch her, to make sure she was really real, to feel her warm, living, breathing body. Now that he has carried her out of this strange cave on Trenzalore and back to the TARDIS, leaving the man that is him but isn't the Doctor behind, his only thought is that she needs to wake up.

He needs her to wake up, to open her eyes and talk to him so he can know how she is doing, how she is coping with everything she has seen and done by now.

Looking her up and down, never ceasing to touch her, he is sure that she's the real Clara, the original one, the one he has saved from the Wi- Fi in London before going back to see her life before taking her on adventures before she stepped into his time line to save him from the Great Intelligence. She is not just a fragment, a splintered version of Clara that fell onto the field where he found her, she is the real Clara.

But he needs her to open her eyes, her beautiful chocolate eyes, and look at him and talk to him and react to his touch and by now, he is panicking, hurriedly checking her signals on the TARDIS infirmary monitors, but there are no signs to suggest that there is anything biologically wrong with her brain or her heart or any of her, for that matter.

She just isn't waking up.

And there seems to be nothing he can do, even though he is the Doctor, so he just sits down next to her and holds her hand until she wakes up again.

~

Every cell of her body feels like it's bursting apart at the seams and coming back together again. She can't move and she can't speak, but she feels her body. She's asleep and awake at the same time and it's painful and peaceful and horrible and good.

The last thing she remembers is meeting the Doctor – her Doctor – in that cave and seeing this strange man she has never seen before although she has seen all of him before collapsing. Now she knows she's lying down somewhere and that someone – the Doctor, probably – is holding her hand, but she can't react to any of it. She's caught in her own mind and suddenly she somehow realizes what's happening.

Her mind is sorting itself, taking the memories of what happened to her and putting them into the right order, starting on Gallifrey when she told him which TARDIS he should steal and ending when they – together again, finally – met a version of him she had never seen even though she had thought that she had seen them all.

And maybe that's why she can't move at all, because her mind is too busy, because this is the top priority right now.

But she wants to move, she doesn't want to remember all her lifes trying to save the Doctor, she wants to wake up to see him again and that's what she is trying to will her body into.

It just doesn't work.

~

A week. A week has passed in the TARDIS and Clara still hasn't woken up. And even though he's the Doctor, even though he hates waiting, even though he can barely remain still for a moment, he stays beside Clara's infirmary bed and holds her hand.

He wouldn't forgive himself if she woke up and he wasn't beside her. He owes her so much by now, he feels like he has to make himself wait for her to wake up.

So he waits. So he holds her hand and sleeps next to her – only once – and brusher her hair out of her face and kisses her forehead and checks her pulse and only ever leaves once every second day.

She wakes up when he's coming back from his third walk around the TARDIS, just as he has taken her small hand back into his own. She opens her eyes warily, blinks a few times and then squeezes his hand ever so slightly.

He can't help the strangled cry of joy that escapes from his mouth and the way his hands fly up to cup her face and stroke her hair as he presses a kiss to her forehead first and then a swift, chaste one to her lips.

"Doctor. Oh Doctor." She whispers, her voice breaking and raspy and weak, but he hears her anyway. "My Doctor."

One hand still in her hair, he just stares at her for a long moment, allowing himself to soak in how she looks. She seems tired and a bit worn, her hair is a bit off a mess and her complexion is rather pale, but she still looks lovely. "How are you feeling?"

She smiles a tiny bit, just the smalles upturn of a corner of her lip, but it makes his heart almost ache with relief. "I'm... I'm okay, I think." She props herself up on her arms, resting her forehead against his. "How long was I out?" She asks.

"Ah... about a week, I think, maybe. Well, you know, it's hard to tell in here, but I slept once and I think you would have slept seven times, so it must be about a week." He explains, running a hand down her bare arm. "How much do you remember?"

She sighs, leaning forward just a bit to steal another quick kiss that becomes a long one somehow. Oh, she had missed this, the feeling of his lips on hers, soft, sometimes a little chapped, sometimes longing and harsh, sometimes barely there, but always lovingly. With every incarnation of him she had seen, she had missed the one that already knew and loved her even more.

It was weird, really. Falling through his time line, feeling as if every cell of her body was falling away from her to form a new life where she'd try to find the Doctor only to die once she had so that said cell could come back to her, she had never really known where she was. Sometimes she had barely known who she was or what she was doing. And none of her versions had remembered the ones before, or the Doctor, only she, the falling one had remembered everything, but while falling, she had been pining for this, pining for the Doctor's, her Doctor's hands and lips on her body.

And now she was here again, curled up against the Doctor, safe and sound back in the TARDIS. Back home.

"I... I remember everything." She finally whispers into his shirt. "Absolutely everything."

~

She is curled up against his chest again on one of the couches in one of the TARDIS' living rooms. There are logs buring in the fireplace they're sitting in front of, her head against his chest, over one of his hearts, and his arms sneaked around her waist. She isn't really tired anymore, but she still doesn't feel like leaving the TARDIS to do some adventuring yet, so they're staying in, reading in the library, swimming, cooking, but mostly talking.

She doesn't tell him all of the truths, if she's honest with herself. Just the parts she thinks she can handle saying out loud.

She doesn't tell him how she almost bit off her tongue trying not to scream when she had entered his time stream because she knew how it would make him feel if he heard her scream in agony or how terribly scared and disorientated she was all the time or how she feels remembering her every death or the heartbreak she felt every time he ignored her or didn't recognize her or treated her like a stranger.

She doesn't show him the little cracks in her very essence.

She's positive that he doesn't see them on his own.

He suddenly lifts a hand and treads it through her hair, twirling one of her brown curls around his index finger. "What would you like to eat for dinner tonight?" He asks for the very first time and the question is so utterly domestic, it provokes her to giggle just a bit. "What?" He asks indignantly and stops playing with her hair.

She shakes her head and turns a bit to smile up at him. "Nothing. I just thought you didn't do domestic."

"I used to not do domestic when I was... about 900 years old, I guess. I'm 1200 years old now, I've matured quite a bit. I do domestic." He answers, messing up her hair with one hand. "Sometimes."

"I know, I've met that version. A few times." She smiles. "You were all big ears and big nose and leather jacket. It was quite fantastic."

"Hm. I can't remember meeting you in that version of myself." He admits, frowning slightly. "And I usually remember everything."

She smiles a bit at that sentence. "Well, once I was only a fifteen year old girl or something like that, telling you to run and save yourself before the vulcan errupted. And once I gave you good shove from behind, so you never saw my face."

He startles and pulls away from her, making her turn so he can see her face. "So that girl at the level crossing who pushed me out of the way..."

"That was me, yes." She confirms solemnly. "I... Doctor, I've saved you quite few times, but never... never like that. I mean, I saved you from Daleks and the Great Intelligence and Cybermen and whatnot, but that... I had to save you from yourself. I had to save you because you were standing on the rails, waiting for a train to come and kill you. What... Doctor, what were you doing?"

He sighs and hides his face with one hand, the other one clutching hers almost painfully. "I... I am so sorry, Clara. I swear I am so sorry I made you go through this." He mumbles and she knows he really is. She hears the pain in his voice and almost instinctly wraps her arms around him, resting her head on his shoulder, the hand he isn't holding treading lightly through his hair. "I... it was the first time I landed somewhere after... after the War, I had just finished the regeneration process and I... I hated myself so much, Clara. This hatred was all I was at that moment and I just wanted it all to be over. So I thought... well, maybe a train could kill me before I started regenerating again. So I went and looked for a crossing and well... I stood there until someone pushed me away, seconds before the train hit that someone." He buries his face in her shoulder for a second, breathing in her scent. "And that someone was you."

"Yes, it was." She whispered. "I had been on my way to meet a friend for dinner and that crossing was part of the way. I was waiting there when you ran onto the tracks and I just... knew. I just knew it was you and I knew I had to save you, so I did."

"I am so sorry, Clara. Please believe me." He whispered into her hair.

She pulled back a bit and pushed his fringe out of his eyes. "I know you are. And I'm okay, Doctor. I'm not yet completely fine, but I'm okay." With a slight smile, she leaned forward and placed a gentle kiss on the tip of his nose. "Don't you worry, chin boy. The worst part is over."

~

It really is, but at the same time, it isn't and she knows that. Yes, the part where she lost a bit of herself out of which a new Clara would grow only so that this version could die and the part she had lost could come back to her was over, but she was still recovering from it. And she wasn't sure if the recovery wasn't just as bad as the adventure.

She has seen things she has never expected to see in the first place and they've lodged themselves in her brain for what feels like forever. Of course she hasn't given up the hope that she will eventually forget because, after all, she is only human and human memory is rather febble, but then again, was she still just human by now? She was sure that nothing in her DNA had changed, but her brain, her character didn't feel human anymore. She was no longer a simple girl who wanted to go traveling, she was no longer a girl who had not really gotten over the loss of her mother, she was no longer a nanny.

No, she was so much more by now. She had become Soufflé Girl. She had stept into the Doctor's time line, spent all of his life with him even if he barely ever noticed and saved him again and again. She had watched the ways of the Universe and she had destroyed the Great Intelligence. She had died so many times that she had finally lost count and was still alive.

She was the impossible girl.

Lying in bed next to the Doctor, she wonders if it's only her impossibilty that intrigues him about her so much and a tiny part of her wants to ask, but she doesn't quite dare to. She's sure he'd call it a ridiculous thought and kiss her forehead, asking her how she got that idea. But then again, the thought keeps nagging at her and she finally turns to face her... well, she doesn't know how to call him. He's the Doctor and a bit he's her Doctor, but not really because after all, he is married. But then again, they were in a sort of relationship which is why she stretches up a bit and places a quick kiss on his lips.

He opens his eyes immediately – she doubts he was asleep in the first place – and pulls her closer against his bare chest, allowing her to breathe in his skin. "You alright?" He whispers.

"I'm a bit of a paradox, aren't I?" She asks, not looking at his face but rather at his collarbone on which she's drawing patterns. "I mean... if I hadn't jumped into the Time Stream, I would have never been in the Asylum..." – she shudders when she thinks of it, that is one of her least favorite lifes even though he had actually noticed him for a change – "... and you would have probably died. And even if you hadn't, I wouldn't have been in Victorian London either. You would have never met me, never taken me traveling... meaning I would have never ended up on Trenzalore to step into your time line in the first place. Maybe I wouldn't even have existed at all."

He cups her face, staring intently at her. "No. You would have existed. You, Clara Oswald, are a real person, with real parents and real friends and a real history and a real life, not just some sort of... creation of the Universe to save me. You, this version of you..." He smiles and places a hand over her heart, feeling it's beat through her thin t – shirt. "... this version I found in London is real and right and human. You weren't born because you stepped into my time line, you weren't born to save me, you were born because a tree had grown over years in a particular place so a certain leaf could grow on it's branches to be blown into your fathers face on a particular day so he could be saved by your mother. You, Clara, are not a paradox, you are a beautiful, snarky, clever, magnificent, bossy, fantastic human being and I'm so glad I have you by my side, do you hear that?"

She feels her throat thighten and her eyes become all wet and teary and then suddenly they spill over and start to run down her face. He wipes them away and pulls her even closer and kisses her forehead. "Oh Doctor." She whispers. His words are all she wanted to hear, all the reassurance she needed.

He strokes her hair and draws circular patterns on the skin of her back, making her feel safe and warm and loved. "You are not okay, are you?" He whispers and she just shakes his head.

"I'm sorry. I'm so sorry I'm not... I'm not strong enough, I'm sorry I can't go out and on adventures yet, I'm sorry I'm not... right, but I just feel so... so... so..." She doesn't find the words and instead buries her face in his chest again, hoping to be calmed down by the beating of his hearts.

"There is nothing to be sorry for, Clara." He whispers into her hair. "If anyone has to be sorry for anything, it's me. I have done almost nothing but endanger you ever since I've met you and you saved my life so many times. You have done something unbelievable, something that would have driven normal people insane. But here you are, all sane and healthy. You're allowed to be not - fine, you're allowed to huddle up in here and be beside me as much as you need. Don't you dare think I would think anything less of you."

~

He is the Doctor and he has known all along, from the moment he had found her in that cave, that he has put her through something horrible and that it will take her some time to recover from it. Waiting for her to wake up in the Infirmary, he had been thinking that he might have lost completely this time, that it had been too much, that the real Clara was dying, burning up from the inside, because he had allowed her to do something so incredible stupid.

The Doctor had been so relieved to see Clara wake up that he had almost started to dance again, but he had wanted to see how she was doing most of all. When she had said that she was okay, he had known it was a lie. But he had allowed her to pretend otherwise because it had been what she needed.

Watching her bake yet another souffle for breakfast the morning after she has confessed that she has seen herself as a paradox, as something that only existed to save him, he thinks back to all the things he has done with her.

He thinks of how she had been clutching her mug of tea all along while he had landed a plane, of how she had called the TARDIS a snog box and asked him to come back the next day. He thinks of handing her the key, of Akhaten and how she had timidly asked him about the Time War afterwards, holding his hand while he had talked, offering him the only comfort she knew how to give. He thinks of how scared he was she would die again when he had found that she had disappeared in a part of the city where murdered girls had been found during the time of Jack the Ripper's terror. He thinks of her joy at seeing Barcelona, of the way she had timidly tried the ice cream – ishy thing he had bought her and of the way she had protested when he had dragged her back to the TARDIS.

For a moment, he wonders if that was part of what had him smitten with her – her refusal to be anything apart from an independent, strong woman that knew how to handle herself – or if it was something else. Maybe the way her eyes spark when she gives a witty response or the way she half – smirks, reminding him of that woman he introduced to da Vinci once. Maybe it's something else entirely.

He remembers the way she stayed in the TARDIS when he talked to River to make a souffle and how empathic she had been afterwards while they were trying to find the shards of the broken bowl. He remembers his own pain and what had felt like an open wound on his chest through which she then had crept in, all "What's wrong with complicated?" and hand – squeezing and a readiness to sacrifice herself if necessary. He remembers taking her to a future Cardiff, where she observed the way her species now interacted with aliens, all wonder and big eyes. He remembers being woken up by her after another horrific nightmare of the Time War – strangely enough, the Dalek that had been here had been there and he had fought it, having to choose between either killing her or being killed himself – and the comfort her arms had given him. He remembers asking her to stay and holding out his hand for her to come to his bed so he could fall asleep and wake up in his arms every evening and every morning.

Maybe it was that moment, he muses, when he first woke up again and there she was, a worried looking human girl with big, worried eyes and messy brown hair, trying to comfort him, that he had suddenly looked up and realized just how much she really meant to him. Or one of the other mornings when he woke up to find her wrapped in his arms, a picture of calm serenity in his arms, making him realize that she was so, so beautiful it took his breath away, even though he had seen so many wonders of the Universe.

He thinks back to when they had to visit a funeral for a girl that had died to save him and she had again comforted her by just being herself. He thinks back to when they went to 1879 and she teased him about the size of his wardrobe. He thinks back to their time on the Russian submarine, the way she bravely faced an Ice Warrior and how she sung an old Duran Duran song. He thinks back to the day that never was, the day she got lost in the TARDIS, found the Eye of Harmony and made him tell her about her other two selves. He thinks back to when she flew the TARDIS into the pocket universe to save him after reminding him to not always say what was on his mind.

He wonders if it had been her cheeky comment about his wardrobe or her bravery facing an Ice Warrior mostly on her own. When he realized she wasn't at his side anymore when the TARDIS had been salvaged, he had panicked, fearing he might lose her again, leading to the realization that Clara was long so much more than just a companion. Thinking he might lose her again if he didn't figure her out, he went back to Caliburn House with her, pretending to be there on some sort of mission while in reality he had only wanted to talk to Emma about her because maybe she could give him some sort of clue to her riddle. And maybe by solving the riddle he could find a way to make her stay at his side forever.

Facing the Cyber Planner he had already been in love with her, something the Cyberman in his mind had tried to use against him by telling Clara about his feelings to convince her he was the Doctor. She had seen right through it, resulting in a slap. And then, after that, they had ended up on the horrific spaceship, something he does not want to think about again, except for this one beautiful moment when she kissed him, her lips all soft and warm and loving.

This had definitely been the turning point for them. Afterwards, they had stopped being "the Doctor and Clara" and had become more like "theDoctorandClara", a two person entity. Afterwards, she had become his.

Stroking back her hair from her sleeping face, he wonders if the situation would be different if he and Clara hadn't become what they were before they had gone to Trenzalore. He knows she loves him – she has, after all, said so – and he's glad she does, but he wonders if she had still stepped into his time line if they had only been friends. Had she only done it because she loved him so much that she did not want to see him suffer? Or had there been another reason as well?

He does not regret becoming what he is with her now, but he does hate that she's damaged – maybe even because of it, maybe [probably] because of him – and that he can do almost nothing to help her. She has done so much for him, breaking apart, starting new lives, dying to save him again and again, and he can barely do anything for her now.

The Doctor knows that Clara is barely okay, that she is cracked and hurt and sad, and he hates it, but he is willing to do everything he can to help her mend herself. He loves her, he has loved her for quite a bit now, and he's pretty sure that he will love her no matter what, so it doesn't matter to the Doctor at all that she's changed.

That's what adventures do to people on occasion. His impossible girl had the biggest adventure of all to save her Doctor.


	2. Carefully

_*peeks around corner* Hello? Is anybody still there? *shuffles nervously with foot* I am sorry. I am SO sorry. It was never meant to take this long to upload the next chapter, which has been done for a long time, but since I kind of hit a barrier when it came to the end of the third chapter, it didn't feel right to post this one. And then I finished school and went traveling and didn't write at all for anything and now I#m back_ _and still haven't finished the third chapter but figured I should upload this one anyway and now I will just shut up and let you read. I am so incredibly sorry. _

Carefully

"Ready?" He whispers into her ear, one hand on the TARDIS' door handle and one over Clara's eyes. Two weeks have passed since she woke up again in the infirmary and while they were eating breakfast, she had said that she was ready to go out again. That's why he landed the TARDIS and guided her to the door, not allowing her to see anything like he had on their first adventure together.

"Yes." She states firmly, then a faint "No." escapes her lips before she speaks again, questioningly this time. "Yes?"

He can't really help the low chuckle that escapes his lips. This is so much like their first adventure together, standing on one of the asteroids, his hands over her eyes and her tentative "yes". In a way, it is a first adventure for them. This is the first time they leave the TARDIS without having secrets from one another. The first time leaving the TARDIS together with all their cards open on the table.

With one hand, he opens the door and gives her a slight push. "Okay, the door's open. Carefully now... just take three steps forwards." He whispers into her ear. She obliges and seconds later, they're outside the ship, under a beautiful, star littered sky.

He hears her soft breathing hitch just a little when she feels the wind of this world on her skin. "Okay. Open your eyes." He whispers and takes his hand from her eyes only to intertwine it with her fingers.

She stares up at the sky, all wide eyes and smiles. "It's beautiful."

He lets go of her hand and rubs them together before telling her to stay right were she is. She does, still too amazed by what she sees while he goes back to the TARDIS and takes out a blanket.

The sky is vibrant with colours, creating patterns she has never seen before. They are always changing and she fears that if she ever looks away, she might miss something or other, a few seconds of beauty she would not have seen, so she doesn't take her eyes of the sky when the Doctor comes back.

"Where are we?" She asks.

He lays the blanket on the cold, uneven ground and pats the spot next to him. "On an asteroid rather close to a planet called Krop Tor." He starts to explain. She whirls around to face him before he can say anything more.

"That's the black hole officially designated K 37 Gem 5? Why did you take me here?" She seems almost a bit scared.

He shrugs and again pats the place next to him. "When I first visited Krop Tor, I thought the sky looked... fascinating. Always wanted to come back and watch from a save distance for a bit."

She nods and sits down beside him, drawing her legs to her chest and crossing her arms in front of the, still staring up at the sky. "I remember thinking so as well." She admits.

He gives her an almost surprised look. "You were there, too?"

She turns and smiles almost bitterly. "I was always there, Doctor. I was everywhere you were. You just almost never noticed." She turns away and stares at the black hole, not giving him a chance to answer. "I was down in the cave system when you arrived, battling the Great Intelligence to stop him from destroying the TARDIS. He wanted to trap you down there after he had destroyed your ship, making you fall into the black hole. I didn't let him."

He wraps an arm around her shoulder and pulls her close, placing a kiss on top of her head. "Thank you." He feels her shrug and can't help but smile. His brilliant souffle girl, pretending her saving his life was nothing. "What happened to you?" He asks.

"I don't remember." She lies. Of course she does, but she doesn't know how he'll react if she tells him that she died falling into the black hole they're now watching. He'd probably feel like he has made a terrible mistake by bringing her here and drag her back immediately. "How long till Rose, you and me arrive down there?" She asks, glancing up at him for just a second to see how he reacts to the name of his former companion. There's no outward reaction, but she sees the hand that isn't wrapped around her clench and unclench.

"A few hundred years till anyone arrives here at all and then some until we arrive." He answers. She nods solemnly. "We can stay here all we want and watch as galaxies break apart."

She untangles her limbs and wraps an arm around him. Watching galaxies break apart and fall into a hole that has killed – will kill? Time travel is hell for her grammar – a version of her in a few hundred year? "Sounds nice."

She isn't even being sarcastic. If she finds a way to forget that she died down there, this could actually be nice.

~

She sits against a big, green rock on this kind of beach he has taken her and he has placed his head in her lap about fifteen minutes ago and keeps begging her to kind of caress him and finally she has enough of his whining and starts doing as he asks.

"But this is an exception, do you hear me, chin boy?" She teases, knowing full well that this isn't an exception and that, if he nags long enough, she will do this again.

He knows this as well. "Of course, my impossible girl."

She smiles just a bit, hearing the new nickname he has given her. And it's the possesiveness of it that makes her heart ache a little less. If he sees her as his, maybe it's a teeny tiny bit more okay that he has a dead time traveler wife out there.

Thinking of River makes her remember something else and she suddenly startles. Her hand stops on the Doctor's cheek and he makes an indignant huff sound, startling her even more. She stares down at him for a moment before finally speaking. "I know your name." Now it's his turn to startle. He sits up and stares at her questioningly. "I... when River said it on Trenzalore to open the doors to your grave, I... I heard it. I mean... I don't know if you noticed, but River... when Vastra started that conference thingy, she was there, too and she somehow held that mental link open, meaning she stayed by my side and when the door opened, that was her. She had said your name and I heard it and I know your name."

"I know." He whispers, watching her face almost terrifiedly.

Suddenly, what he just said hits her and she understands. "You saw her. You knew River was there all the time." He nods silently. "You saw here all the time, ever from the moment I took of your blindfold, didn't you?" He nods. "Where you seeing me at all that day?" She wonders aloud and he doesn't answer and that's why the next words fall from her mouth. "You know... it was good training for afterwards. Not being seen by you. I mean... I had so many lives and you almost never saw me. I was born. I found you or the Great Intelligence or both and I fought him and I saved you and then I died. Again and again and again. And you... you barely ever saw me." She bites her lip and closes her eyes for a few seconds. She wouldn't cry now. Not about something like this, not about... jealousy and a hurt ego. She refused to. "But her... you saw her. Of course you saw her all the time."

She hangs her head and hides her face behind her hair, using it like a curtain to shield herself from the Doctor so he doesn't see the way she's chewing on her lip to stop herself from either crying or saying more and so she doesn't see his expression. It doesn't keep her from hearing his whispered response – "She's my wife." – that sounds a bit apologetic and full of defiance at the same time.

And she knows, she has known so long that River is his wife and that she'll never be able to take River's place – she doesn't want to, somehow, not really – but it hurts because she remembers the way he looked right through her or at a point behind her shoulder most of the time while they were on Trenzalore and she remembers the courage she had to have to jump and she remembers all those times before and after when his hands were holding hers, when he hugged her and linked her arm with his and called her names and she remembers the feelings of his lips on hers, of his hands on her bare skin, of his body and it just hurts.

"And what am I?"

The question is out of her mouth before she can help it and she's sorry she asked it because she doesn't want to cause him any pain, but she isn't sorry because she deserves an answer. She really does, everything considered, so that's the reason she won't be backing down now that he parts her hair and cups her face and forces her – gently as always – too look at him.

He smiles his sad smile, the one she knows so well and, by now, understands completely. "You are Clara Oswald. My Souffle girl. My impossible girl. You are my Clara. You saved me every single time, you took every upturned scale and turned it right and you took every victory that had been turned into defeat and turned it back into a victory." His smile becomes happier and he takes a little break to let the words sink in. "But you were so much more before that already. Do you remember Mister Clever, the Cyber Planner? Do you remember what he said?" She just nods, doesn't dare to speak just yet. "He was right, you are so funny and pretty. And so brave and so smart and just and compassionate and brilliant. And you were a mystery, I was thinking about you all the time and I was noticing everything and I was trying to solve you and a tiny part thought that that's what fascinated me about you, but when I called you 'the only mystery worth solving', I already knew that even if I ever solved you, you'd still fascinate me. Because you were enigmatic to me, but that wasn't what it was about. That wasn't what it was about at all."

She leans against his shoulder and by now, she knows. She has spent so much time with him and she knew already anyway, but if she will ever doubt her knowledge again, she just needs to remember this moment.

After all, he doesn't say 'I love you'. He loves and he acts on it, but he never uses those three words. He uses other words, more words, less words, more meaningless – and thus more meaningful – ones and she knows, because she watched it all happen to him, saw him say those other words to people and now she has heard it himself. And if he ever uses those words, it means it's all in the past already.

But sometimes, when the Doctor starts talking, he doesn't stop. Now is one of those times.

"And River... she died. She dies. She will die. She died the first time I met her and the whole bumpy – wumpyness of it doesn't matter because no matter how many times I have seen her alive, she's still dead. I've never cared much about how other people saw time lines, the way I view and experience them counts to me and the way I have experienced it, she's dead. And she saved me and killed me and loved me and I saved her and I didn't save her and I loved her and we've said our last goodbyes to one another. Even if I see her again, it won't be... right. It will never be right again now and it wouldn't have been right again if I had seen her again before Trenzalore."

She pulls away just a bit and locks her eyes with him, placing both her hands on his face. He looks happy and sad and complete and heartbroken and confused and wise and old and young at the same time and a bit – more than a bit – loving.

"I understand." She says.

~

They've stayed clear of anything dangerous so far, but she knows that he's itching to get back out there, to do what he does best, so save, to fix, so two days after their stay at the beach, as she cleans their breakfast plates, she turns around and says: "Hey, chin, turn on the Randomizer when you fly today, will you?"

She doesn't need to turn around, she knows he's smiling his face – splitting, brilliant, sappy smile before she feels his lips on the back of her head and hears his "Will do, love." and then his steps leaving the kitchen with that bounce she enjoys so much.

Once she's finished the washing up, she walks back to the console room – sometimes the way is longer than other times, she thinks the ship still doesn't like her that much – to find him there, running around the console and she just watches because he looks just so happy.

~

"This is weird." She says and stares. "I mean, I'm used to weird stuff, being around you all the time, but this... this is really weird. Incredibly weird, even by your standards."

He looks at her funnily and wrinkles his nose. "What's supposed to be weird about this? It's a fun house. Most normal thing in the Universe." He tells her reassuringly – their third adventure after and he hopes she doesn't get scared – and steps out of the TARDIS, kind of dragging her behind him.

She frowns at his back and asks "It's the mirror maze of a fun house. But a fun house where?"

"What does it matter?" He asks and his coat swivels behind him impressively and she giggles just a bit.

Now she follows him out and links her hand with his. "It doesn't." She confirms but it doesn't take long until it matters again.

He's so focused on trying to find a way out of the maze that he doesn't look at the mirrors, but she does and it is so strange. It's so incredible strange because yes, those are him and her, but somehow there are reflections of other people behind their reflections and they all stare even as they move.

This is when she lets go of his hand to step closer to the mirror, watching carefully as all the reflections instantly turn their gazes on her, even his, although the real him is already three steps away.

Hesitantly she stretches out a hand to touch the mirror, watching as her reflection does the same and she expects to feel the familiar feel of glass under her finger tips, but instead finds a different feeling entirely. It's like a cold, thick liquid, a bit resistant, as if it's trying to push her away, but she's sure that if she tries hard enough, applies enough pressure, she can push through.

She calls his name, knowing that the little hitch at the end of the last syllable will tell him that she needs him, but the cold, thick feeling that has been under her fingertips is now around her hand and when she calls for him again, she is scared.

He's at her side within seconds, in total shock at first, but quickly scanning her arm and the liquid and then checking the readings. "No. Not possible!" He exclaims and then scans it all again, checking the readings again before he grabs her arm and drags.

It suddenly hurts, the liquid, it isn't cold anymore, it's burning and breaking her apart again and she screams "Doctor!". He looks so panicked then, trying to get her out off it, but then suddenly his face is gone. He is gone.

And it scares her because for a long time he has been the only constant in her life, for the almost – year she has spent in the TARDIS with him and the hundreds of years she spent falling.

Within seconds, she fights the fear back into it's corner and starts to check her surroundings. But it's dark and all she can hear are distant sobs, voices that scream someone's name, most of them unknown to her until she hears a voice that sounds just a bit familiar – all the Doctor's voices mixed together – and she starts running towards it.

~

How does one go about breaking a mirror that is made of a liquid?

That is the question he is trying to answer ever since his impossible girl has been taken from her and he isn't much closer to an answer than an hour ago. Maybe he can change the molecules into something more solid, more mirror – like with his sonic and then break it, but so far, it has only worked on a very tiny speck of the mirror – ish thingy and as soon as he lets go of the sonic's button or changes the setting, it changes back instantly.

So far the only thing he does is trying to make a patch of changed molecules bigger than his fist. Maybe, if he finds a way of steadying the sonic with one hand – it can't wobble or wave at all, because as soon as it does, the molecules become liquid again – he can crack it with the other one. Or he might just use his foot. Or his head.

It doesn't matter at all, he'll break this stupid mirror somehow and get his girl out. And if that doesn't work, he'll just go in after her and find a way to break them out from the other side.

Then he suddenly notices the change in a bit of mirror right to the speck he hasn't been pointing the screwdriver at and he realizes that it's big enough. Almost instantly he takes one hand of the sonic and rams it against the surface.

It cracks just a tiny bit.

~

She has stopped running, trying to reach this familiar, but not quite right voice and is on her knees, hands pressed against the floor, trying to shield her ears from the screams that echo through the dark.

This is horrible, a black eternity filled with screams of anguish and pleas for someone to be saved, but she can see no one, nothing at all.

Except suddenly there's a crack, right between her hands. It's tiny, but it's there and there's light flooding through it.

~

His knuckles are bloody and aching, but that doesn't keep him from hitting the mirror. The cracks are widening and maybe, if he can wrap his fingers around a shard and pull it away, he can see or find what is behind it.

Then a few of the cracks connect and there it is, an almost A – shaped shard and he forces his fingers into the cracks and tugs with all his strength while still using the sonic to stabilize the molecular structure. He rips and tugs and with a kind of slurping sound it comes of, pulling strands of the liquid with it and somehow turning the liquid space next to it into a solid surface.

Holding up the sonic with one hand, he gets low enough to peer through the hole and, after that, forces his hand through, gripping the edge of the next biggest shard and ripping it off. He repeats the process, completely ignoring the pain in his limbs until he has made an opening big enough for himself. Without a second look, he walks through.

The room he finds himself in is filled huge pods, big enough for two humans, and seem to stretch endlessly around the room, but he finds hers fast enough. He runs towards it and, without looking at the camera above him, rips it open and starts to deactivate the protocol.

She comes back from her unconscious state within minutes, coughing and looking terrified, but as soon as she recognizes him, she wraps her arms around him, burrying her face in the crook of his neck.

"I've got you, I've got you. You're save now." He whispers into her hair. She feels weird, like she has been bathing in some sort of slime. "And you need a shower."

He lets her go and she hits him in the chest, smiling up at him. "Only if you join me."

Taking her hand, he helps her out of her pod and back onto the floor. "I suppose I could do that once we've sorted this thing out."

~

"So basically they had stuck us in those pods after knocking us out and making us hallucinate with the mirror liquid, making us run in our hallucinated world to feed of the energy our bodies would create?" She tries to summarize the situation, still puzzled. They sit on the floor of one of the TARDIS's bigger bathrooms, both clad in bathrobes, both with wet hair and, in Clara's case, with a mug of tea in their hand.

He nods and fiddles with her small hand. They're sitting opposite each other, legs crossed, on the most fluffy carpets in their home. "You and all the others were trashing around while hallucinating. The slime you were covered in absorbed the energy that created and turned it into fuel for their ship." She crunches up her face in disgust. "Well, the slime part is a rather interesting bit. Shame you didn't let me keep any of it."

"Of course I didn't! That stuff was disgusting!" She exclaims in an almost mock irriation.

He grins and leans forward, taking a playful swipe at her nose. "And yet you still have some of it on your nose." Smelling it for a second, he leans forward even more and gently kisses her.

She smiled as his lips move against hers while he starts undoing her gown. The carpet is fluffy, after all, and rather comfortable.

~

She stares at him while he's tinkering with a bit of the TARDIS, lying in a hammock he has somehow managed to put there for when he needs to repair something at the ceiling he can't reach comfortably standing up.

Gnawing at her lower lip, she contemplates if she should ask or not. Quite a bit of time has passed since Trenzalore and there's something she needs to know, but hasn't dared to ask yet. Finally she decides that since this question has been beating at mind's walls almost permanently since she woke up again, she can just as well give in and ask.

With a tiny sigh, she stands up from her place on the floor where she had been sitting, pretending to read, and walks up beside the hammock. Giving his shirt sleeve a light tug, she draws his attention back to her. He pushes his ridiculous safety googles from his face – "They're cool, Clara!" – and turns to face her. "What's up?"

She clears her throat and pushes back a stray lock. "Doctor, I never asked... but the man we saw in the cave where you found me again... what's his story?"

He climbs – falls – out of the hammock and they sit down on the floor, his arm around her shoulder, leaning against the wall. "Do you remember what I told you when we saw him?"

"You said your chosen name – Doctor – had been like your promise. And he'd been the one to break the promise. Which means that he was the one that didn't heal or save or fix things. Right?"

"Right." He allowed himself a bitter smile. "And you said you all of me. You were there all my life, weren't you? You were there for every bit of it."

Suddenly, her eyes widen. "But I wasn't! I... I wasn't on Gallifrey during the War. I don't know why, but both the Great Intelligence and me stayed away from it. And since I didn't see that version of you and since he isn't a future you, he must be..." She turns to him, her eyes wide and clear, her face still surprised from the realization, but there's a calm asuredness that she's right underneath it. That doesn't change that she asks for his confirmation.

"Exactly. That's who he is."

~

What Clara hasn't told the Doctor is that she has seen all of his life and all of his faces. She pretends she only saw eleven, but she saw his last face, too. She saw the face he has now, the one she saw first and the one she loves possibly the most – she loved them all, his kindred old face with the white hair, the black haired, often grumpy seeming one, the one with the blonde, curly hair, the big – eyed one with his almost ridiculously long scarf and the wide – brimmed hat, the pretty one with the sleek blonde hair and the round cheeks, the second one with blonde curly hair, the mischieviously grinning one with his question mark umbrella, the strict one with the watch, the big – eyed, big nosed one in the leather jacket and the one with the weird, but lovely hair – turn into a new one and she didn't know why back then, but she was crying her eyes out when it happened.

But that isn't the worst part. The worst part is that she has seen it happen, the unthinkable thing, she has seen what happens to place the TARDIS on Trenzalore. She has seen him die and it haunts her. It makes her sad and sometimes angry and it scares her to think of a Universe where there's no Doctor anymore but at the same time, he is everywhere at once, saving everyone and everything and she's always just two steps behind him, having his back.

Until the one moment where she can't save him.

Now this moment is the one that comes back to her in her worst nightmares, the ones she wakes up from with a wet face, having cried into his chest quietly because she's been too scared or too sad to scream. Afterwards, she lies next to him, placing her hands where his hearts are, feels their beating revibrate in her skin and listens to his breath.

She knows he'll die some day and that she can't prevent it from happening, but this is now, he's by her side and he's alive and that's all she cares about. Even though this is maybe how he feels about her, too, because not only has she seen the end of the Doctor's story, she has seen the end of her own story as well and she knows that he knows that her story will end because they all do someday.

~

Some nights the Doctor is lying awake next to her and hears her sob faintly from a nightmare that has it in it's grasp. He doesn't dare to wake her up and he doesn't really know how to talk to her when she wakes up, so he doesn't. He pretends to be asleep instead, feeling her soft, small hands on his chest and when she glides back into sleep, he rubs circles into her back to ease the tension of her muscles.

Writing in Gallifreyan on the bare skin of Clara's shoulder, he realizes that she has gotten better. She isn't holding on barely anymore, she is back on her feet and starting to carefully take the first steps back out into the world. It doesn't mean she doesn't have nightmares anymore, it doesn't mean she has stopped being scared, but she has stopped hiding.

He is glad about it because he missed the adventures and the fun he had with Clara by his side. Of course he enjoyed the calm times of sitting around and doing nothing with her, but he is the Doctor. Saving people is what he does and he isn't completely happy if he doesn't do it.

Then again he was helping Clara mend herself when they were spending time in the TARDIS together and he knows that that's why she is able to walk carefully again now.

Having lost her to the mirror scared him because this is the real Clara, the one he can't lose. He wouldn't want to pick up an echo of her to take with him anyway, it wouldn't be the same. She's Clara, his Clara, and he needs her and that means he'll have to be a bit more protective, a bit more careful again.

It doesn't bother him at all. The Doctor will do everything more carefully if that means he'll have Clara by his side.


End file.
